How to delete all versions of a versionable node?

[jkraushaar]

Hi there,

I have a versionable nt:file node. The parents of the node are not versionable.

When I delete the node, the nodes stored in jcr:system/jcr:versionStorage are still available. I cannot access these information using the Versioning API getVersionHistory method (PathNotFoundException). I can access it by navigating to the jcr:system/jcr:versionStorage nodes, but they are protected. So I have no chance to delete those information after removing the node.

Even if I delete all versions of a versionable node before deleting the node, jcr:system/jcr:versionStorage still contains data (the root version).

This is especially a problem when it comes to files: The binaries are never marked as unused as there are still references to them. (I did not find a way to reduce the refCount value to 0, yet.)

Is there any chance to delete all versions of a versionable node when the node is deleted or to throw away all data in jcr:system/jcr:versionStorage which is no longer accessable through the API?

Thanks

Jochen

[rhauch]

The JCR standard API does not define a way to do this, but ModeShape added a custom API to remove nodes and their version histories in 4.0. See the org.modeshape.jcr.api.version.VersionManager.remove(String path) method, and the MODE-1839 issue describing the changes, some reasons why we implemented it this way, and workarounds with the standard JCR API that get you almost there.

[hchiorean]

I cannot access these information using the Versioning API getVersionHistory method (PathNotFoundException). 

why is this exception being thrown ? You should be able to interrogate the version history of a versionable node. If that's not the case, then there's either a bug somewhere or some data became corrupted in the version history. Once you have the version history of a node you can call #removeVersion to remove all specific versions of a node. After you've accomplished that, rhauch describes how you can completely clean up the version tree.

[jkraushaar]

I called getVersionHistory() for an already deleted node. If the node still exists, calling the method will return the VersionHistory object as you described.

[jkraushaar]

Are there any best practices if I want to delete a shareable node (and the complete shared set) using this method?